Course description:

This course will explore questions in comparative constitutional law and will focus on the constitutional law of Germany and Israel. It will compare issues of constitutional structure & constitutional principles, judicial review and rights adjudication.

Almost 70 years after its adoption, the German Basic Law has come to be regarded - both in the German and in the international scholarship - as a "success story". This course will introduce and analyze - from a comparative perspective - selected topics in the German Constitutional Law and jurisprudence, which influenced the jurisprudence of many younger constitutional courts and courts with constitutional adjudication inside and outside Europe, including the Israeli Supreme Court. Israel's constitutional history is unique: for more than 40 years after its establishment as a state, Israel lacked constitutional provisions for the protection of human rights. Israeli constitutional jurisprudence on human rights was based on an unwritten, or judicial bill of rights developed by the Supreme Court. Accordingly, the Supreme Court has been playing a particularly dominant role in constructing fundamental constitutional concepts given the lack of a full written constitution.

Against this background, the course will study how the German and the Israeli courts interpreted rights and constitutional principles to address similar problems. Central examples that will be discussed are the principle of proportionality, its development in German law, its adoption in different systems of law and the interpretation that was given to it as a constitutional principle in German and - in comparison - in the Israeli law, the status and importance given to human dignity as a constitutional value and a constitutional right and the evolution in the constitutional protection of social rights.

Methodically, the course will analyze the protection of fundamental rights in the case law of the Federal Constitutional Court and will juxtapose this adjudication with the constitutional adjudication of the Israeli Supreme Court.

The course will take place in from of an intensive weekend course from Friday, May 3 to Sunday, May 5, 9:00 - 17:30.
Location: tca.

Method of evaluation:

Attendance, reading of assigned materials, and active participation; Concluding assignment for FU-students: a written exam.

Language:

The course will be held in English.

Prerequisite:

Constitutional Law / Staatsrecht II-Grundrechte

Frequency:

The course will be held in summer semester 2019. close